Mollie Thompson - Heralding the Dawn

Mollie Thompson was just an ordinary British Housewife... until one day in the 1960s she was contacted by benevolent Venusians. (Thanks Martin)

Updtate; MP3's removal requested  - sorry...

See comments for more info on Mollie

On a related front: If all stories were written If all stories were written like science fiction stories. (Thanks Johan)

Comments

[The MicroSyphallitic Kid]

Well, that was a tease. Howzabout reposting the Mp3s so's that Geocities don't shut down the site, main?

[John from Oslo]

Oh, shoot Geocities - If the site is down tomorrow, I'll UL the files myself. WFMU has got at least one song you can stream in the meantime...

http://wfmu.org/playlists/shows/17562 (Shrunken Planet with Jeffrey Davison - December 31, 2005)

A damn shame it is, because the original link had some interesting stories about the woman, and Adamski... Be patient kids - I'll fix it in about 10 hours.

[John from Oslo]

From the Geocities site

Mollie Thompson - Heralding the Dawn

Introduction

Mollie Thompson - from worlds afar Mollie Thompson, imagined by Simon Murphy

From Worlds Afar is a lovely album of simple country-folky tunes by a woman from Stockport in the UK, just her on acoustic guitar and the occasional tambourine, singing about UFOs and aliens. But they aren't mean abducting, anal-probing or cattle-mutilating aliens, they are benevolent wise beautiful aliens in one-piece silver suits, offering us a chance of a better future if we only stop fighting wars etc. The music is gentle and optimistic, and funny.

I bought this record in the late 1990s - it's a private pressing (essentially a DIY project) from some time in the 1960s. I was getting interested in UFO kitsch and recognised George Adamski's hubcap and ping-pong ball UFO on the cover, so I snapped it up. He had been discredited in 'serious' UFO circles in America by the late 1950s, but his stories were so hopeful and utopian that some just couldn't let them go.

I don't know who Mollie was, what happened to her, or what she looked like – the drawing above is how I imagine her. I was hoping for a younger Mary Whitehouse, but couldn't get the glasses right. If anyone knows anything about her, please get in touch.

Simon Murphy
Contact: museum at popmail dot com

SONGS

Mollie Thompson - back sleeveOriginal sleeve notes from the album From Worlds Afar - click the titles to hear the songs.

There is a surprise around every corner – and one of the biggest and loveliest surprises that met me was to the discover that there IS life on other planets and in other galaxies. And so how was I to set about sharing this fact with other people? I have tried talking to them – a few listened with interest but the majority dismissed the whole idea s science-fiction-fantasy.

It is almost as though I have a garden full of roses, all of different colours and perfumes, but when I open the gate and invite people into my garden they run in the opposite direction as fast as they can go.

People are funny things but I am very fond of them – so now I am going to see how far my singing will carry. You can join in and sing, you can dance if you want to, or you can just sit and listen and see if you like the thoughts you can hear. The words and music came into my head, though I am neither a writer nor a composer, so I think I can saythat this record is the result of "inspiration" – a word which to me simply means "breathing in" – (the air in my rose garden is full of a variety of novel ideas).

Mollie Thompson

1) The Cockeyed Ballad (.mp3, 516kb)
I start with a smile on my face, for although living is a serious occupation it also has its funny side. Even so I am not laughing AT "The Institution", I am laughing WITH it.

2) Three Wise Men (.mp3, 620kb)
Life seems to be presented to us in three sections – the past, the present and the future; but I prefer to think of it as a string of NOWs all joined together.

3) From Worlds Afar (.mp3, 672kb)
The story in this one could happen to any one of you at any moment. It might come as rather a surprise when it happens but if you get accustomed to the idea first you will find yourself more able to sit back and enjoy meeting these new friends.

4) Heralding The Dawn (.mp3, 420kb)
Who wrote this one for me I wonder? Perhaps someone who knows more about us than we know about ourselves – so I am glad that they see the dawn as a rosy glow.

5) Isn't It Amazing (.mp3, 348kb)
A human brain is a fascinating instrument. It can ask questions but the answers that come out must depend upon "how the computer is programmed" – and we do not have all the information yet because it is a huge universe.

6) There's A Lot I Could Tell You (.mp3, 628kb)
Someone else taking a look at us – and it seems as though she is down here among us, but not as a tourist, more like a public relations officer.

7) Time No More (.mp3, 496kb)
I am not entirely sure what time no more implies – unless it is suggesting we can live fully in each NOW as it arrives without regrets for past or apprehension for future.

8) Space Talk (.mp3, 732kb)
We can send our envoys into space, visit all sorts of other worlds, and their technology will give us more of a boost than any booster rocket.

9) Dawn Breaks (.mp3, 348kb)
This is a glass full of champagne bubbles – light and joyful the human equivalent of the dawn chorus of birds who have woken up after being asleep for so long.

10) Think Big Thoughts (.mp3, 668kb)
This last song is the golden key to all tomorrows – a "do-it-yourself-handbook." Thoughts are such powerful things for they shape the world in which we live. The world which my inner eyes view is peopled with a race of human angels. They will have a dictionary in which you cannot find such words as hate, fear, poverty or disease – tomorrow's earth will even have forgotten what these unlovely concepts were.

Long Play Play 33 R.P.M. Mono

Asteroid Records JH 101
Nield & Hardy Ltd
Stockport Cheshire England

All songs written and performed by Mollie Thompson

Background

Mollie Thompson seems to have been one of George Adamki's fans in England, where he was championed by Desmond Leslie and other writers associated with the oddball publishers Neville Spearman. Though Adamski died an old man in 1966, they continued to reprint his 1950s books Flying Saucers Have Landed and Inside The Space Ships well into the 70s. Thompson's vision of the beatific all-knowing space brothers closely matches Adamski's elaborate Venusian fantasies, as well as elements of classic early 1950s sci-fi films like The Day The Earth Stood Still.

See also: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Adamski
Adamski's hub cap and ping pong ball flying saucer Adamski's 1950s photos of the Venusian 'Scout Ship' are amongst the best known of all UFO images, yet they were effectively exposed as fakes by Yankee magazine in the US as early as May 1954. Writers at the magazine shot their own photos of an uncannily similar craft made from a coffee can lid, a Chrysler hub cap and three ping-pong balls.
Space Brother One thing that Adamski and his followers were fixated about (and that Mollie specifically refers to in The Cockeyed Ballad) was the seamless one-piece silvery outfits worn by their alien friends. This one was sketched in the mid-60s, but contains all the features of Adamski's original alien contacts in the California desert in 1953. It was published in a book suggesting that Adamski was somehow reincarnated as a Venusian called Yamski, and appeared to an acolyte in Devon in 1964.

[vivvy]

I bought this Mollie Thompson album back in the 60s when it first came out........great album and a fantastic production,i only wish i still had it but alas the years pass by so fast..

[Andy Roberts]

Hi,

You might be interested to know that Mollie Thompson is still very much alive! I traced her a few years ago and did an extensive interview which was written up in a chapter for my book (with Dr David Clarke) Flying Saucerers (HOAP 2007). It's a fascinating story.
However, I would ask you, seriously, to take the Mollies music from your site as it is still under her copyright and we are looking to commercially issue the albukm on CD in 2008.
Thanks

Andy

[Mollie Thompson]

Mutterings from Mollie.

Yes,I'm still here--alive and--if not kicking, at least the motor is still ticking over.
Somebody said to me the other week,
'So, what are you doing now ?'
I had to have a little think about that, but eventually I came up with a reply.

"The secrecy of my work prevents me from knowing what I am doing"

It is over 40 years since I wrote and sang those songs about space people. I didn't know what I was doing then either...but I had great fun doing it.

I'm sure you have guessed by now that I never actually met and spoke with flesh and blood space people in silver suits who had arrived in their vehicles : flying saucers or UFO's.
Vehicle is the key word here; my songs were the vehicle to carry my thoughts and ideas out into the world. But as for who wrote them ?? I was NOT telling lies when I said that it was not me...certainly not the "me" that is sitting here writing this.

Every person is far MORE than the sum of their parts, and MORE than they appear to be.

Each individual is more knowing, more understanding, more loving and more loveable, and each of us has the potential to be a truly wonderful human being. That MORE was what created the song words and also what pushed me gently aside and took over the driving of the vehicle---for a while. Then someone was jumping back into the driving seat saying 'Step back, let me live this life'.

However, the older I get the more I hope to see MORE at the wheel, driving the vehicle.
She is a better driver than I am !
Cheers,
Have a good life,

Mollie Thompson.

[BC Sterrett]

Where's the cd release?